The living room was ultramodern. The chairs and the couch were surrealist dreams of squares and angles. Even the coffee table was balanced precariously on little pyramids that served as legs. Two framed wood nymphs seemed cold in their nudity against the background of the chilled blue walls. I wouldn’t live in a room like this for anything.
Myra held her position in the middle of the floor, legs spread, hands shoved in her side pockets. I picked a leather-covered ottoman and sat down.
She watched every move I made with eyes that scarcely concealed her rage. “Now that you’ve forced your way in here,” she said between tight lips, “perhaps you’ll explain why, or do I call the police?”
“I don’t think the police would bother me much, kiddo.” I pulled my badge from my pocket and let her see it. “I’m a private dick myself.”
“Go on.” She was a cool tomato.
“My name is Hammer. Mike Hammer. York wants me to find the kid. What do you think happened?”
“I believe he was kidnapped, Mr. Hammer. Surely that is evident.”
“Nothing’s evident. You were seen on the road fairly late the night the boy disappeared. Why?”
Instead of answering me she said, “I didn’t think the time of his disappearance was established.”
“As far as I’m concerned it is. It happened that night. Where were you?”
She began to raise herself up and down on her toes like a British major. “I was right here. If anyone said he saw me that night he was mistaken.”
“I don’t think he was.” I watched her intently. “He’s got sharp eyes.”
“He was mistaken,” she repeated.
“All right, we’ll let it drop there. What time did you leave York’s house?”
“Six o’clock, as usual. I came straight home.” She began to kick at the rug impatiently, then pulled a cigarette from a pocket and stuck it in her mouth. Damn it, every time she moved she did something that was familiar to me but I couldn’t place it. When she lit the cigarette she sat down on the couch and watched me some more.
“Let’s quit the cat and mouse, Miss Grange. York said you were like a mother to the kid and I should suppose you’d like to see him safe. I’m only trying to do what I can to locate him.”
“Then don’t classify me as a suspect, Mr. Hammer.”
“It’s strictly temporary. You’re a suspect until you alibi yourself satisfactorily then I won’t have to waste my time and yours fooling around.”
“Am I alibied?”
“Sure,” I lied. “Now can you answer some questions civilly?”
“Ask them.”
“Number one. Suspicious characters loitering about the house anytime preceding the disappearance.”
She thought a moment, furrowing her eyebrows. “None that I can recall. Then again, I am inside all day working in the lab. I wouldn’t see anyone.”
“York’s enemies. Do you know them?”
“Rudolph . . . Mr. York has no enemies I know of. Certain persons working in the same field have expressed what you might call professional jealousy, but that is all.”
“To what extent?”
She leaned back against the cushions and blew a smoke ring at the ceiling. “Oh, the usual bantering at the clubs. Making light of his work. You know.”
I didn’t know anything of the kind, but I nodded. “Anything serious?”
“Nothing that would incite a kidnapping. There were heated discussions, yes, but few and far between. Mr. York was loath to discuss his work. Besides, a scientist is not a person who would resort to violence.”
“That’s on the outside. Let’s hear a little bit about his family. You’ve been connected with York long enough to pick up a little something on his relatives.”
“I’d rather not discuss them, Mr. Hammer. They are none of my affair.”
“Don’t be cute. We’re talking about a kidnapping.”
“I still don’t see where they could possibly enter into it.”
“Damn it,” I exploded, “you’re not supposed to. I want information and everybody wants to play repartee. Before long I’m going to start choking it out of people like you.”
“Please, Mr. Hammer, that isn’t necessary.”
“So I’ve been told. Then give.”
“I’ve met the family very often. I know nothing about them although they all try to press me for details of our work. I’ve told them nothing. Needless to say, I like none of them. Perhaps that is a biased opinion but it is my only one.”
“Do they feel the same toward you?”
“I imagine they are very jealous of anyone so closely connected with Mr. York as I am,” she answered with a caustic grimace. “You might surmise that of any rich man’s relatives. However, for your information and unknown to them, I enjoy a personal income outside the salary Mr. York pays me and I am quite unconcerned with the disposition of his fortune in the event that anything should happen to him. The only possession he has that I am interested in is the boy. I have been with him all his life, and as you say, he is like a son to me. Is there anything else?”
“Just what is York’s work . . . and yours?”
“If he hasn’t told you, I’m not at liberty to. Naturally, you realize that it centered around the child.”
“Naturally.” I stood up and looked at my watch. It was nine fifteen. “I think that covers it, Miss Grange. Sorry to set you on your ear to get in, but maybe I can make it up sometime. What do you do nights around here?”
Her eyebrows went up and she smiled for the first time. It was more of a stifled laugh than a smile and I had the silly feeling that the joke was on me. “Nothing you’d care to do with me,” she said.
I got sore again and didn’t know why. I fought a battle with the look, stuck my hat on and got out of there. Behind me I heard a muffled chuckle.
The first thing I did was make a quick trip back to the filling station. I waited until a car pulled out then drove up to the door. The kid recognized me and waved. “Any luck?” he grinned.
“Yeah, I saw her. Thought she was an old bag?”
“Well, she’s a stuffy thing. Hardly ever speaks.”
“Listen,” I said, “are you sure you saw her the other night?”
“Natch, why?”
“She said no. Think hard now. Did you see her or the car?”
“Well, it was her car. I know that. She’s the only one that ever drives it.”
“How would you know it?”
“The aerial. It’s got a bend in it so it can only be telescoped down halfway. Been like that ever since she got the heap.”
“Then you can’t be certain she was in it. You wouldn’t swear to it?”
“Well . . . no. Guess not when you put it that way. But it was her car,” he insisted.
“Thanks a lot.” I shoved another buck at him. “Forget I was around, will you?”
“Never saw you in my life,” he grinned. Nice kid.
This time I took off rather aimlessly. It was only to pacify York that I left the house in the first place. The rain had let up and I shut off the windshield wipers while I turned onto the highway and cruised north toward the estate. If the snatch ran true to form there would be a letter or a call sometime soon. All I could do would be to advise York to follow through to get the kid back again then go after the ones that had him.
If it weren’t for York’s damn craving for secrecy I could buzz the state police and have a seven-state alarm sent out, but that meant the house would crawl with cops. Let a spotter get a load of that and they’d dump the kid and that’d be the end of it until some campers came across his remains sometime. As long as the local police had a sizable reward to shoot for they wouldn’t let it slip. Not after York told them not to.